The owner of Allentown’s Crocodile Rock Café, one of the busiest club-sized concert venues in the world, is asking Lehigh County Court to stop its primary promoter from pulling out eight more of its biggest planned shows because the club lost its liquor license.

SLP announced March 5 it was moving nine concerts it had booked at Croc Rock – about half the venue’s schedule -- to Allentown’s Main Gate Nightclub, Stroudsburg’s Sherman Theatre, Musikfest Café in Bethlehem and other venues because the shows could not be profitable without liquor sales.

Crocodile Rock lost its liquor license in January after the state Liquor Control Board's Bureau of Licensing objected to a license renewal. It said Crocodile Rock is a nuisance bar and cited incidents such as a 2009 shooting in which a 23-year-old man and 19-year-old woman were shot leaving a rap concert.

The first concert SLP moved, hard rock group In Flames, was successful at Main Gate, SLP President Stanley Levinstone said. The next scheduled shows to be moved are Adrenalin Mob on March 15 to the club Goodfellas in Pottsville and Every Time I Die on March 16 to the club Reverb in Reading.

SLP said in an e-mail that it “has no reason to believe that any of SLP Concerts’ presently scheduled shows will be in any way impacted and all ticket holders and other colleagues in the industry should not assume anything to the contrary unless otherwise notified.

“SLP Concerts also has not received a copy of any lawsuit filed by the Crocodile Rock Café nor any court order impacting the venue or time of any of the shows at issue.”

The e-mail also said SLP would not comment on comments made by Crocodile Rock Café “except to say that the allegations that have been made against SLP Concerts are without merit and false and it has referred the matter to its attorneys.”

The Crocodile Rock filing seeks a temporary injunction stopping the concerts from being moved, and a permanent injunction restoring the concerts to Croc Rock.

The filing says Crocodile Rock entered into an agreement with SLP in 1999 to book shows for a fee, but that on March 5, SLP breached that agreement by, without notice, moving the shows, for which tickets already were sold, to other venues.

It says the shows being moved “has irreparably harmed Croc Rock and its reputation and will continue to do so unless” the shows are restored.

"These shows were moved arbitrarily and with no notice to the Crocodile Rock causing Crocodile Rock a loss of revenue and tortious interference to our reputation in the international world music community," the club said in a statement.

Other shows moved by SLP are As I lay Dying and The Devil Wears Prada on March 19 to Maingate, AWOLNATION, March 22 to Sherman Theater, R5 on April 7 to Maingate, The Rev. Horton Heat on April 10 to Musikfest Café, Opeth on April 27 to Sherman Theater and Rebelution on May 4 to Reverb.

Crocodile Rock is appealing to havve its liquor license reinstated, and has said it will continue to offer concerts, and has a show by Sirens and Sailors and Arc of the Covenant scheduled March 15.

It really is pointless unless croc rock can force SLP to keep them on the books for more shows because if you just look at what Shows SLP offers and what croc rock has without SLP you will notice most of the shows SLP promotes are they ones that make the money

Posted By: BigSexy | Mar 14, 2013 9:53:38 AM

A living contradiction to say the least didn't fat man Clark say other promoters and agents were lined up to work with him..... BYE BYE Rock Lord !!!

Omg. Stop crying, you are mega rich already. You own half of Allentown. I am happy R5 is moving to Maingate, now I will take my kids. Joe Clark is a perfect example of the rich and greedy...

Posted By: Carrie Seagreaves | Mar 14, 2013 11:21:35 AM

It is pointless to force any business to do something that will lose them money. Forcing the promoter to stay will just hurt the artists who would play there and the promotion company. The promotion company is there to do what is best for its artists and to make them money. If Croc Rock is not profitable, let it fail. If there is a market for concerts in a safe and profitable venue another one will come along before too long and it’s more business for other places. Although, as someone who played on the stage there as part of a local band I am sad to see Croc Rock go. It was a nice place for a while there and the staff are largely good people.

Posted By: Matt W | Mar 14, 2013 11:52:25 AM

This is just a symptom of the original problem. Revoking the liquor license for one of the only successful places that people go in that area of town is nonsense. It leads to many unintended consequences such as promoters pulling out.

He is contradicting himself by trying to force controls on the promoter. However, let us not forget that this problem is a branch on the tree of what the government/courts did first and now it is causing hardships for others.

Don't think about the guy who runs Croc Rock if you don't want to but think about the people that work there and the way it helps others.

Posted By: Contradiction | Mar 14, 2013 1:05:50 PM

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Posted By: wjhon | Mar 14, 2013 1:47:56 PM

It looks like karma has finally bitten Joe Clark right in the a--. It serves him right for allowing tenants of his rental properties to live in deplorable conditions. I have visited several friends that live in the properties and i was glad to leave. They are so crammed, often have leaky roofs, and doors that do not close right due to the slant of the buildings. If he took better care of his rental properties and tenants, I MIGHT feel bad for him. But when it takes MONTHS for him to have someone look at a leak in a roof and all they do is place duct tape over the hole, I'm sorry but you have lost all my sympathy. Two of my friends had a baby living in an apartment with a leaky roof and windows that were not properly weatherized. It took Clark 3 months to have someone "fix" the problems. They waited 3 months during a very cold winter to have the problems looked at and Clark still expected his rent on time.

Posted By: Randy Stevens | Mar 14, 2013 2:19:00 PM

Well of all the people to yell foul let see isn't Clark a Landlord with tenant lease contracts--he should know that the four corners of the contract when renting or contracting a facility for performance is that will and can generate a crowd and be "intact" of the original building and licenses as provided for at the time of signing and any thin less is considered a breach of contract--Joe call Shattenstein he don't know much be knows at least this much!

Posted By: glenn Miller | Mar 14, 2013 7:59:22 PM

I hope this place shuts down. They don't know how to run shows or treat hardworking local bands. They just throw them in the basement. Croc is a sorry excuse for a venue. Any band I play in or have played in had refused to play there unless it was a main stage show, but even they weren't worth it. The place is a joke.

Posted By: Rob | Mar 14, 2013 9:21:47 PM

If anyone knows of anyone having landlord problems with this let them know of us the Tenant Association of Allentown....www.taofallentown.org

JOHN J. MOSER has been around long enough to have seen the original Ramones in a small club in New Jersey, U2 from the fourth row of a theater and Bob Dylan's born-again tours. But he also has the number for All-American Rejects' Nick Wheeler on his cell phone, wrote the first story ever done on Jack's Mannequin and hung out in Wiz Khalifa's hotel room.

OTHER CONTRIBUTORS

JODI DUCKETT: As The Morning Call's assistant features editor responsible for entertainment, she spends a lot of time surveying the music landscape and sizing up the Valley's festivals and club scene. She's no expert, but enjoys it all — especially artists who resonated in her younger years, such as Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, Tracy Chapman, Santana and Joni Mitchell.

KATHY LAUER-WILLIAMS enjoys all types of music, from roots rock and folk to classical and opera. Music has been a constant backdrop to her life since she first sat on the steps listening to her mother’s Broadway LPs when she was 2. Since becoming a mother herself, she has become well-versed on the growing genre of kindie rock and, with her son in tow, can boast she has seen a majority of the current kid’s performers from Dan Zanes to They Might Be Giants.

STEPHANIE SIGAFOOS: A Jersey native raised in Northeast PA, she was reared in a house littered with 8-tracks, 45s and cassette tapes of The Beatles, Elvis, Meatloaf and Billy Joel. She also grew up on the sounds of Reba McEntire, Garth Brooks and Tim McGraw and can be found traversing the countryside in search of the sounds of a steel guitar. A fan of today's 'new country,' she digs mainstream/country-pop crossovers like Lady Antebellum and Sugarland and other artists that illustrate the genre's diversity.